Digital inking has become a popular feature in many software applications. In many instances, a canvas is provided in a user interface to an application through which a user may supply inking input by away of a stylus, mouse, or touch gestures. The inking capabilities provide the user with an easy and natural way to interact with the application.
The eraser mode is one sub-feature of many inking implementations. When operating in an eraser mode, a user can erase ink that was previously laid down on the canvas in a way very similar to that of erasing pencil from paper. A user may need to perform an explicit action to enter an eraser mode from a draw mode, such as selecting the mode from a feature menu, selecting a button on a stylus, or flipping over the stylus to use a digital eraser element on the stylus.
In general, such explicit actions implicitly call for a pen-up action to take place prior to the explicit action of entering the eraser mode. Unfortunately, this may take the user out of a creative flow and may have other drawbacks from a more technical perspective. For instance, some applications commit ink to persistent storage upon the occurrence of a pen-up action, thus requiring relatively processor intensive operations to erase any of the ink.